


Paranoia

by typhe



Category: Valdemar Series - Mercedes Lackey
Genre: Closeted, Dubious Consent, LHM, M/M, Outdoor Sex, reluctance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-08-15
Updated: 2012-08-15
Packaged: 2017-11-12 05:29:02
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Underage
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,968
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/487230
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/typhe/pseuds/typhe
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>One slip and we'll be destroyed.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Paranoia

**Author's Note:**

> This fic was inspired by a few conversations about the imbalance in Tylendel and Vanyel's relationship & Van's inability to say 'no' to 'Lendel - therefore, dubcon.

"You took your sweet time -"

"Someone saw me," Vanyel replied shortly, and leaned against the sturdy forked branch of a tree, breathing heavily. Tylendel, who had been lounging on the bed of needles looking both indolent and mischievously impatient, sat up suddenly, his smile gone. "I slipped out the garden door and - and - there was a man walking around the corner. It's alright, I - turned round and pretended I was sneaking _in_ , not out, then I waited a good while before leaving again. Maybe he didn't see me." He was trying to convince himself as much as 'Lendel, maybe more so.

"Who was it?"

"I don't know," he replied. He would never lie to Tylendel, but - it was true, really; he didn't _know_. The moon was on the wane, and he'd only heard a step and seen a shadow, barely enough to even know that it was a man. He didn't _know_ who it had been, he had no possible way of knowing, and it was only fear that was rooting in his mind the idea that it had been Evan Leshara.

That would be ridiculous, in any case. Whatever underhand schemes Evan was running, why would he be spying on _Vanyel_? He was only a feckless lordling, not anyone of consequence.

_I'm just panicking,_ he told himself. _I've every reason to panic - one slip and we'll be destroyed. Doesn't matter who it is. We shouldn't even be risking meeting here like this._ Tylendel rolled to his feet and embraced him, and Vanyel stood frozen in his arms, half of him wanting to bolt and the other half wanting to melt. He felt a hand ruffle his hair, a stray pine needle prick against his scalp. "No one saw you come in _here_ , did they?"

"No," he wavered. Again, true enough. Could he be sure? Could he really be sure? Tylendel always left a few minutes ahead of him, through the window of his own room which faced a different side of the garden to Vanyel's, and they never both took the same path to get here, often changing their routes from one escapade to the next. It wasn't _possible_ that anyone knew. They'd been so careful. Not even _Savil_ knew about their evening walks, as far as he was aware.

"Then relax," ordered Tylendel, and tightened his arms around him. Vanyel sighed, and let his head rest against 'Lendel's shoulder, fervently hoping it really was alright. _Please_ , he thought frantically, hoping that some god out there would hear him. _Please let us be safe together._

But he knew of no gods that guarded men like them.

Tylendel shifted, arm slung over Vanyel's shoulder, and drew him deeper into their grove. It had always felt safe here. It was close to black under the trees, with just a little moonlight dappling a path and illuminating 'Lendel's face, making his dark eyes shine in the shadows. Darkness was kind to them, a cloak and a comfort. Just breathing here - slowly, the scent of pine and earth and evening dewfall and 'Lendel beside him - tasted like freedom, like a thin crack in the walls that surrounded his life.

Sharing a room, and a bed, with Tylendel meant a lot to him, but part of him still longed for them to walk in the daylight together.

After minutes of slow, circling steps, with Van feeling his nerves unwind in fractions of inches, Tylendel knelt down in front of the tree where he'd begun, pulling Vanyel down with him. Van sat with his hand and his knee brushing 'Lendel's, eyeing the undergrowth, reminding himself that they were alone. _We're alone, please, let us alone here._

He could barely see 'Lendel now, but had a feeling that his lover was smiling again, the calm of their haven returning him to the mood that Van had found him in. _Well, at least one of us is happy -_ Tylendel leaned close, and his lips touched Vanyel's; Vanyel froze, and several insistent seconds passed as he remembered how to respond.

Slowly, he drew a hand up behind 'Lendel's shoulder, allowing him to deepen the kiss. This wasn't how it usually happened. Most nights, they just talked in whispers below the night sky, or held hands quietly. They did kiss sometimes, often teasingly as they prepared to return home, Tylendel leaving him alone in the grove with his skin fit to burn, or if Vanyel left first, he would stumble his way back over the field and fall atop the covers of his bed, unlacing his clothes frantically, waiting naked and needy for the soft sound of Tylendel's footfalls on the floorboards outside.

He could feel 'Lendel's want rising, stoked by the movement of tongue over tongue. Hands curled around Vanyel's body, running down to his waist-

\- Tylendel pulled Van's belt open and slipped cool hands under his clothes. Vanyel felt his heart thrumming hard, and turned his face away. _"Lendel,"_ he whispered.

"Hmm?" Tylendel's voice was warm, and felt heavy with lust against his neck. "Did I startle you?"

"Yes," he said shortly, fear rising again.

"I'm sorry...I've been thinking about this for a while now. All week, really." He sighed, and wrapped an arm around Vanyel, leaning down until they both rested on the earth. His free hand kept stroking Van's skin, tracing from ribs to hips under his loose linen shirt. The night suddenly felt chokingly hot. "I was waiting for the full moon to pass, so it wouldn't betray us..." He wrapped his lips around Vanyel's earlobe, then pressed them down his neck. So gentle. So giving. So insistent.

"What if someone finds us?" he hissed. "It's not safe."

"No one's going to find us." He was nonchalant, recklessly confident. "If you must know, I asked Gala to keep watch from outside." Vanyel had wondered where she was. She knew? Well, he supposed Companions fooled around in here all the time. But her knowing somehow made him more uncomfortable. "Besides, safe is boring. We'd go mad if we never left our room, wouldn't we?"

_Safe is having somewhere to hide._

He breathed against 'Lendel's shoulder, and for a moment he felt distant from his own body - seeing himself from faraway and many months in the past, clinging to the stones of Forst Reach with his toes. The things he'd done to get to his secret hiding-place. The very _unsafe things_ he'd had to do to find sanctuary.

He wanted to go back. In their room, he had everything - privacy, music, Tylendel's body tangled hot against his own, no fear of strangers in the night; all he had to worry about there was the future. Endlessly. Some days, he felt like the walls were closing in.

'Lendel extracted one hand, and ran it through his hair again. "You relax and enjoy taking a chance for once. Trust me, _ashke_." He shifted downwards, and unfastened Vanyel's breeches.

Whatever wariness Van was feeling, his cock didn't share it. Not even slightly. He could feel Tylendel suppressing a laugh of triumph, hand brushing gently against the staff.

_He loves me,_ thought Van, confused. _He's not trying to use me or take anything from me. This is just his way of - of making me happy. It's not his fault I'm in a terrible mood._ Tylendel's tonguetip teased around his navel, and his lips pressed lower, tracing a path down his skin. _Safe is boring? Really? So this -_ He felt fingers teasing the base of his cock, kneading him from ridge to ridge, making him want to cry out _\- this is -_

He felt so _exposed_. Suppose someone _did_ blunder into them, what would they do? He could hardly flee with his breeches around his ankles, and Tylendel was _almost a Herald_ and would be required to explain why he was breaking Savil's curfew. The grove might feel like their own private world but really, it was in _public_. In the Palace grounds. Where anyone might -

_\- this is freedom. If we really didn't care - if we were like any of the boys who take girls down to the riverbank grottoes - it would be fine. We'd be as free as anyone. It's not fair._

He pressed three fingers to his mouth as Tylendel's lips closed over him. Keeping silence, he was used to, just like any boy who'd grown up sharing rooms with his brothers. Sleeping in company, with a hand under the sheets and his mind full of fuddled thoughts about handsome stableboys, thoughts quickly banished before he could face and name them - he was so used to having hiding-places, from the world and himself. _He never had the chance. They called him cursed, they knew he was different -_ 'Lendel began to work downwards, firm pressure augmented with swipes of his tongue. _Oh gods and saints, that feels good, I feel good, I feel terrified, I don't even know which is which any more._

He looked down, and in a thread of moonlight he saw Tylendel's eyes, dark and definite. _He wants me,_ Vanyel told himself incredulously for the thousandth time. _Not even to fuck, but to - oh - he just wants to make me his. Anywhere._ 'Lendel had pulled further back, to swirl his tongue rapidly over the sensitive back of the head. _I'm his. Have to be. Hate pretending I'm not. I won't ever deny him. Oh gods, please do that again. I can't -_

A sound, perhaps ten feet away, made his heart freeze.

Tylendel's movements stopped dead, and it was several seconds before he raised his head. "Rabbit," he whispered. "Gala says." 

Vanyel exhaled hard, and almost choked. He hadn't realised he'd been holding his breath. Tylendel grasped his cock again, and Vanyel twitched. This was _far_ too risky - suppose it hadn't been a rabbit? _We should stop,_ he thought. But the burst of pure terror, which surely _should_ have made him lose interest entirely, had only made him _harder._

And Tylendel knew it.

_Why can't I be normal?_ He sighed quietly and stared down at Tylendel, who was planting gentle kisses over the length of his cock. "See?" murmured 'Lendel. "Nothing to worry about. So come for me," and he set a flourish on the demand with his lips and the play of his fingers, his tongue setting a rhythm that Vanyel couldn't resist. _He wants to make me come? Here? This is insanity._ But he was close to the edge of his pleasure and Tylendel brought him closer with each moment. _This was dangerous enough as it is, I don't want to risk more - but he wants me to -_ So close, and he felt so vulnerable _\- but I always trust him when I'm vulnerable. If he wants me, I'm his. I owe him this. Owe him everything. Feels - so - good -_

He bit down on his curled hand, fighting back a moan, his hips lifting to push him up in Tylendel's mouth. It was many seconds before he sank down; all tension had gone from his body, and he felt a hollow throb shaking him from his thighs to his ears.

He opened one eye, and found Tylendel sat between his knees all but licking his lips. "I told you to trust me."

Vanyel rolled over on his side, not sure what to think about that. "I do trust you," he replied. He wouldn't lie to Tylendel, would he? "Should I, uh, do you want me to, return the favour?"

"Later," replied Tylendel with an easy shrug. "I just wanted to please _you_." He got to his feet and brushed his clothes down with his hands, pine needles tumbling everywhere. "I'll be waiting for you," he promised, and ducked through the trees, vanishing from Vanyel's sight, and moments later from his hearing also.

He lay still in the dark, clothes still unfastened, watching the sinking moon.


End file.
